The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1887-11-11
MANKATo FREE PRESS
rAlnAY- NovRMaER II 1887.
CONCORD AND DlSC0RD.
OR. TAi.MAGE breaches AT THE
BROOKLYN TABERNACLE.

| Oh. INl-NASE fhGROr1CO ~ iE'G
BROOKLYN TABERNACLE.
| The Whole Universe Was Once Com
| plete Ca,Ience-Discord Brought About
by Sin-The Human Intellect Out OF
| Tune-How to Restore Harmony.
| BROOKLYN, Nov. G.-The main feature. in
| the music of the Brooklyn tabernacle is the
congregational singing. Today, after the
| opening song, in which all the thousands
heartily participated, Professor Browne gave
| on the organ Scherzo, opus 81, by Mendels-
sohn. The Rev. T. De Witt Talmage, ID. D.,
expounded a chapter in the first book Of
Samuel, where Saul, possessed of an evil
| spirit, threw javelin at David, who was
| playing on the harp before him, thus show
ing that the evil spirit does not like sacred
music The subject of the sermon was "Con-
| cord and Dscord," and the text was from
Job xxxviii, @, z: "Who laid the corner stone
thereof; when the morning stars sang to-
| getheri' DR.. Talmage said:
| We have all seen the ceremony at the lay
ing of the corner stone of church, asylum or
Masonic temple. Into the hollow of the
stone were placed scrolls of history and inn
portant documents To be suggestive if one or
two hundred years after the building should
DO destroyed by fire or torn down. We re-
member the silver trowel or iron hammer
that smote the square piece of granite into
sanctity. We remember some venerable man
| who presided, welding the trowel or ham,
mer. We remember also the music as the
choir stood on the scattered stones and
timber of the building about to be con-
| structed. The leaves of the notebooks fiut-
| tered in the wind and were turned over with
a great rustling, and we remember how the
bass, baritone. tenor, contralto and soprano
voices commingled They had for many days
been rehearsing the special programme, that
itmight be worthy of the corner stone laying
In my text the poet of Uz calls us to a
grander ceremony-the laying of the founda-
ton of this great temple of world. The
corner stone was q block of light, and the
trowel was of celestial crystal All about
and on the entertainments of cloud stood the
angelic choristers, unrolling their librettos
of overture, and other worlds clapped shin
ing cymbals while the ceremony went on,
and God the architect, by stroke of light
after stroke of light, dedicated this great
cathedral of a world, with mountains for
pillars, and sky for frescoed ceiling, and
towering fields for floor, and sunrise and
midnight aurora for upholstery. "Who laid
the cornor stone thereof, when the morning
stars sang toGetherG"
The fact is that the whole universe was q
complete cadence, an unbroken dithyramb, a
musical portfolio. The great sheet of i'm
mensity had been spread out, and written ON
it were the stars, the smaller of them minims,
the larger of them sustained notes The
meteors marked the staccato passages, the
whole heavens a gamut, with all sounds, into
nations and modulations, the space between
the worlds a musical interval, trembling of
stellar light a quaver, the thunder base
clef, the wind among trees treble clef That
is the way God made all things, a perfect
harmony.
But one day harp string snapped in the
great orchestra. One day a voice sounded
out of tune. One day discord, harsh and
terrific, grated upon the glorious antiphone
1t was sin that made the dssonance, and that
harsh discord has been sounding through the
centuries. All the work of Christians, and
philanthropists, and reformers of all ages, is
to stop that discord and get all things back
into the perfect harmony which was heard at
the laying of the corner stone when the
morning stars sang together. Before l get
through, if l am divinely helped, will make
it plain that sin is discord and Righteousness
is harmony.
That things in general are out of tune is as
plain as to musicians ear is the unhappy
clash of clarionet and bassoon i'm an orches-
trail rendering.
The worlds health out of tune: Weak lung
and the atmosphere in collision, disordered
eye and MONDAY light in quarrel, rheumatic
limb and damp weather in struggle, neural
gias, and pneumonias, and consumptions,
and epilepsies in fiocks swoop upon neigbor-
hoods and cities. Where you find one person
with sound throat, and keen eyesight, and
alert ear, and easy respiration, and regular
puisatioa, and supple limb, and prime diges-
ton, and steady nerves, you find hundred
who have TO be very careful because this, or
that, or the other physical function is disor-
dered.
The human intellect out of tune: The
Judgment wrongly swerved, or the memory
leaky, or the will weak, or the temper in
fiammable, and the well balanced mind excep-
tional. Domestic life out of tune: Only
here and there a conjugal outbreak of incom-
patibility of temper through the divorce
courts, or a filial outbreak about fathers
will through the surrogate'S court, or a case
of wife beating or husband poisoning through
the criminal courts, but thousands of fam
lilies with June outside and January within.
Society out of tune: Labor and capital;
their hands on each others throat. Spirit of
caste keeping those down in the social scale
in a struggle TO get up, and putting those
who are up in anxiety lest they have to come
down. No wonder the old pianoforte of So
ciety is all out of tune when hypocrisy, and
lying, and subterfuge, and double dealing,
and sycophancy, and charlatanism, and re-
venge have for 5000 years been banging
away at the keys and stamping the pedals
On all sides there is a perpetual shipwreck
( ~,
realizing it, so wrong is the feeling of nation
for nation that the symbols chosen are fierce
and destructive. In this country, where our
skies are full of robins and doves and morn
ing larks, we have for our national symbol the
fierce and filthy eagle, as immoral a bird as
can be found in all the pathological cata-
logues In Great Britain, where they have
lambs and fallow deer, their symbol is the
merciless lion. In Russia, where from be-
tween her frozen north and blooming south
all kindly beasts dwell, they choose the growl-
ing bear: and in the worlds heraldry favor
lite figure is the dragon, which is winged
serpent, ferocious and beautiful. And SO fond
is the world of contention that we climb out
through the heavens and baptize one of the
other planets with the spirit of battle, and
call it Mars, after the god of war, and we give
to the eighth sign of the zodiac the name
of the scorpion, creature which is
chiefly celebrated for its deadly sting. But,
after all, these symbols are expressive of the
way nation feels toward nation. Discord
wide as the continent and bridging the seas
/ suppose you have noticed how warmly in
love dry goods stores are with other dry
goods stores, and how highly grocerymen
think of the sugars of the grocerymen on the
same block And in what eulogistic way
allopathic and homeopathic doctors speak Of
each other, and how ministers will some
times put ministers on that beautiful cook
ing instrument which the English call spit,
an iron roller with spikes on it, and turned
by a crank before hot fire, and then if the
minister being roasted cries out against it,
the men who are turning him say: Hush,
brotherl we are turning this spit for the
Glory of God and the good of your soul, and
with:
"Blest be the tie that binds
Our hearts in Christian love-"
The earth is diametered and circumfer.
enced with discord, and the music that was
rendered at the laying of the worlds corner
stone, when the morning stars sang together.
is not heard now; and though here and there,
from this and that part of society, and from
this and that part Of the earth, there comes
up thrilling solo of love, or a MARBLE OF
worship, or sweet duet of patience, they are
drowned out by discord that shakes the